‘Music Man’ stays alive on Broadway

Unions approve four-week pay cuts

NEW YORK — Broadway’s offstage labor drama continues.

New York locals of the Intl. Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees met again on Wednesday to discuss possible 25% pay cuts for employees working on “The Music Man.” Producers of the Broadway revival had posted a Sept. 30 closing notice on Tuesday after their reportedly unsuccessful talks with IATSE on Monday.

Late on Wednesday, Actors’ Equity and the Society of Stage Directors & Choreographers approved the four-week pay cuts, as did at least five of the six IATSE locals. The unions also voted unanimously to extend the pay cuts for “Kiss Me, Kate” from two to four weeks, which now puts that musical in line with concessions previously granted to “Chicago,” “The Full Monty,” “Les Miserables,” “The Phantom of the Opera” and “Rent.”

For the first time, Disney requested similar labor concessions for one of its shows, the troubled “Beauty and the Beast,” which grossed only $312,188 last week. Those figures represent a 38.6% drop from the show’s previous 8-perf session (Sept. 3-9) when it took in $509,036 on its gross potential of $764,478 at the Lunt-Fontanne Theater.